This guide on Local SEO is specifically for service providers and business owners that are finding difficulty in getting higher rankings in search results and real response from their target audiences (be it calls, form fills, visits or whatever you term as lead for your business).
Before we proceed, we would like to give you a quick sneak peak to let you know what you’ll learn today through this content piece:
- Local SEO basics (Definition + How it works)
- Real-results you can expect with right local SEO execution
- 6-easy steps to execute Local SEO for your business website
- Tried and Tested tips on Local SEO by our team
- SEO Packages for Small & Local Businesses
What Local SEO is Really About (Clearing Your Building Blocks First, So Rest Becomes Easier to Execute)
Local SEO, also known as Local Search Engine Optimization, is an online lead-generation strategy being used by regional store owners to attract customers from their surrounding area, neighbourhood or city for their physical or digital storefront.
Wondering how it works? Here’s a quick overview- Suppose, you run a coffee shop, now if you implement a local SEO strategy and optimize all its essential elements for your store, your business will show up in the top search engine results when someone types “best coffee near me” or “coffee in [your town name]” and for many other high-intent search queries.
Here are the Results We’ve Delivered for 100+ Clients Through Our Local SEO Services (With Right Execution, These Results Can be Yours Too)
Yes, it’s possible. We’ve successfully achieved these results for our clients and increased their profits. But what about your business? Are you seeing the same kind of growth?
With disappointment if you have to say not yet; don’t worry we’ll walk you through how to get there. With right SEO strategies once your store gets optimized locally, you will start getting real-intent customers as well as top-rankings in search results.
Now, to those who will say we can get top-rankings immediately even with Google Ads, to that, we would like to say yes, it’s not a bad idea to make an investment there. But, remember your visibility will stop the moment you stop paying.
On the other hand local SEO continues delivering organic visibility to your store without the need to pay per-click costs.
Now it’s up to you- will you take the high-cost shortcut or choose the smarter, lower-cost strategy that delivers steady, lasting results for your store?
This is the 6-Step Local SEO Plan for Your Business Website (Easy-to-Execute)
Whether you are a beginner or someone who is looking to build, fix and scale local visibility for your store, these 6-steps are going to deliver you the results you are aiming for your store. Eager to learn the execution? Let’s get started!
Step 1: Set Up (or Fix) Your Google Business Profile
Google Business Profile (GBP), formerly known as Google My Business (GMB), is a free tool created by Google for local business owners to let them add their business’s essential information like location, hours and services.
In case you have not registered on this tool or your profile is incomplete (like it misses FAQs specifically related to “near me” queries or is poorly categorized), your chances of appearing in local search results and on Google maps significantly decrease.
GBP is just like your homepage in the Search Engine Result Pages and therefore optimizing it becomes really very very important.
Here we are sharing 10 Easy Strategies to Optimize Google My Business Profile Listing for the ones who’ve not set-up their profile yet.
In case you’ve optimized your profile already, use this list to cross-check if everything is done in the right way.
Step 2: Build Separate Page for Each City and Service That Do Not Feel Copy-Pasted
Local stores that serve immediate areas only (like a local bakery or any other food item shop), a single landing page is enough to inform search engines and users what they are, offerings they sell and where they are from.
However, if you are a multi-location business, your offering might stay the same but physical location changes for each region. In this case, you update a different address to help customers find your store, similarly, you need to make search engines understand clearly what you do and where you do it.
For each city page, you have to include:
- Your target keyword (primary service + city) in the title, H1 tag, URL and opening paragraph.
- A short introduction of your service.
- Google reviews from customers (specifically from that area).
- Job-site photos, local staff bios.
- Local FAQs your customers ask.
- A clear, unique call to action (CTA) tied to the target location.
( In case you want to rank in cities where you don’t even have a physical address, implement these result-driven techniques. These are proven and have delivered noteworthy results for a few of our clients)
Step 3: Request Reviews Manually or Set Up Tools to Collect Them Automatically
Reviews boost both visibility and customer trust. We understand for new stores, getting real local reviews can be a struggle and for established businesses, the challenge often lies in managing and responding to it effectively.
So, let’s share some ideas that will help you get and handle review management easily:
- You can use automated tools like Birdeye, Podium or even free Google review links to request feedback.
- Try sending polite templates via text or email asking your customers to leave a review after a service.
- Always respond to reviews. You can thank the good ones and address the negative ones politely.
Step 4: Build Local Citations and Ensure NAP Consistency
For those who are hearing the term ‘citation’ for the first time, let’s familiarize you with it. A citation refers to your business name, address, and phone number (NAP) appearing on local directories and relevant websites.
Here are the best and common ways to build local citations:
- Leverage Data Aggregators (like Yelp, Facebook, Apple Maps, Foursquare).
- Submit identical NAP details to all platforms (Yellow Pages, Yelp, Google, Apple Maps, Yahoo Local, and Bing).
- Try using Local Directories and Niche Sites (these site selection depends on the niche) only.
Still unsure what we mean? Choose to read our dedicated blog on how to build local citations where we’ve explained all the methods and shared required information.
NOTE: Consistent citation building matters, but do not forget NAP accuracy in citations matters more.
Step 5: Local Link Building (Even Without Blogging)
Yes, even without creating blogs, you can earn backlinks for your local store. How? Just by following the below-mentioned ways:
- Sponsor local events, sports teams or charities (if it is possible) as it’s a golden opportunity to get genuine links back to you.
- Create partnerships with nearby businesses and exchange backlinks (like if you are a coffee shop, you can link back to the nearby bakery shop and there are many more such ideas).
- Pitch yourself for local news features or community roundups.
For those who want to learn more, head over to our blog – Local Link Building Guide to Improve Local Search Visibility
Step 6: Track Your SEO Leads
Now this step will help you understand whether your efforts are paying off or not. Here, we are listing some easy ways to track SEO leads:
- Check Google Business Profile insights weekly and see what keywords bring traffic (you can also use Google Search Console to find user queries that no other tool provides)
- Track KPIs like clicks, calls, direction requests and form submissions
- You can also add a custom thank-you page after form submissions to track conversions easily in Google Analytics.
Tried-and-Tested Tips on Local SEO by Our Expert Team
Over the years, we’ve delivered outstanding results for 500+ clients across various niches. Along the way, we’ve gained valuable experience that sharpened our team’s expertise, and now we’re passing that on to you through these actionable tips (specifically related to Local SEO).
1. Submit and Complete Your Google Profile Verification Without Delay
Remember, Google doesn’t recognize your business as legitimate and ‘you’ as its rightful owner until you claim your business on the platform and complete the verification process.
GBP is your real asset on the search engine and if you leave any of its details incomplete, you will risk losing valuable local traffic.
To those, who have completed the GBP verification, here are some bonus recommendations from our team:
- Upload real photos of your store and products (geo-tagged photos and posts on your GBP send freshness signals to the platform)
- Add every service you provide.
- Set accurate business hours.
- Fill out your services, description, and FAQs (like all fields).
- Post updates regularly.
- Ask happy customers for reviews (minimum 10) and respond to all of them.
2. Select the Most Relevant and Specific Google My Business Category for Your Business
Most business owners choose a broad option or even over-optimize their primary category thinking this will attract them more customers, but this is the biggest mistake they are making as this only dilutes the relevance.
However, it does not mean you have to stick to 1 primary category always. You can expand (like add a secondary service category) but before that you have to establish strong topical authority in your primary category.
Google just needs clarity and not clutter. So, the rule that more categories implies more rankings does not follow here.
Ler’s inform you the right way to make a category selection:
- Choose the most accurate, niche category that fits your business.
- If you are unable to choose yourself, look at top-ranking local competitors and see what categories they use.
- After selecting your primary category, use the secondary category that supports the primary one( e.g., a cafe that also serves breakfast might choose “Café” as the primary and “Breakfast Restaurant” as secondary).
3. Regularly Update Your Business Hours, Contact Information, and Service Area
Outdated business info can lead to missed visits or calls from potential customers and as a growth-focussed owner you would not like to lose them.
So, keep a regular check and update:
- Business hours (especially for holidays)
- Phone number
- Address or service area
- Website link
- Service list or menu
4. Focus on Mobile Optimization to Rank Higher for “ Near Me” Queries
Customers need instant, location-based results and the sites that succeed in providing so (means able to offer good user experience) rank higher in search results.
Most of the “near me” queries are asked through mobiles. So, making your site load fast becomes most important.
Here are some suggestions that will help you optimize your site for mobile devices:
- Put your phone number, address, map and open hours right at the top so that users do not have to dig around for it on mobile.
- Use clickable phone/email buttons.
- Embed Google maps and an Apple Maps link.
- Keep site loading speed under 2 seconds (in case your site is slowing down, use Page Speed Insights to analyze the cause) .
5. Add Money Keyword Pages on Your Site to Get More Customers
Many websites have streamlined architecture, showcase services or products in a presentable way, provide basic company information but what they lack is the content, structure and SEO strategy to rank on search engines like Google.
And to get this, a site must focus on building real landing pages targeting money keywords like “AC repair in charlotte”, “ Affordable Root Canal treatment in Tucson”. These pages do not help getting higher rankings directly but one can expect more conversions.
Try making these landing pages clear, local and that’s how you can get more conversions.
6. Establish Trust with Google to Improve Local Map Pack Rankings
Google-like search engines have already set some parameters and the site that passess all of them gets ranking in the map pack.
To help you build trust with Google, here are some suggestions:
- Acquire more local backlinks.
- Build consistent NAP.
- Upload GPS-stamped images.
- Get real reviews with location names.
- Implement internal linking to distribute authority to your location or service pages.
To see how you rank in different parts of your city, you can also use tools like Local Falcon. This helps in monitoring GeoGrid rankings.
7. Make Your Website Content More Relevant and SEO-Friendly
To rank locally, you need to strengthen your on-site content and the foundational step to achieve this is keyword research through which you get the terms that your audience is actually looking for.
You can also check our blog on – how to do keyword research to see the exact steps and approach we follow to get keywords strengthening SEO and relevance factor.
SEO Packages Tailored for Small Businesses and Local Websites
For site owners who want to put Local SEO into action with us and are curious about our pricing, you can explore our SEO packages. You’ll find a complete list of plans designed to suit different business needs and goals.
Choose the one that suits your industry and growth goals. And, even after exploring the packages you feel the need to discuss anything specific or want a customized plan for your site, we’re always ready to create a custom solution for your business.
Wrapping Up
With this we are going to wrap our discussion on local SEO. By implementing the strategies mentioned in the blog, you’ll be able to get the same results for your store as we are getting for our clients.
While executing any strategy, if you get any confusion or require our direct assistance to handle SEO of your store, feel free to connect our expert team. We are always here to support and guide you!
